Judges 6:31

6:31 But Joash said to all those who confronted him, ¹  “Must you fight Baal’s battles? ²  Must you rescue him? Whoever takes up his cause ³  will die by morning! ⁴  If he really is a god, let him fight his own battles! ⁵  After all, it was his altar that was pulled down.” ⁶ 

Judges 11:2

11:2 Gilead’s wife also gave ⁷  him sons. When his wife’s sons grew up, they made Jephthah leave and said to him, “You are not going to inherit any of our father’s wealth, ⁸  because you are another woman’s son.”

Judges 13:23

13:23 But his wife said to him, “If the Lord wanted to kill us, he would not have accepted the burnt offering and the grain offering from us. ⁹  He would not have shown us all these things, or have spoken to us like this just now.”

Judges 18:1

The Tribe of Dan Finds an Inheritance

18:1 In those days Israel had no king. And in those days the Danite tribe was looking for a place ¹⁰  to settle, because at that time they did not yet have a place to call their own among the tribes of Israel. ¹¹ 

[6:31]  ¹ tn Heb “to all who stood against him.”

[6:31]  ² tn Heb “Do you fight for Baal?”

[6:31]  ³ tn Heb “fights for him.”

[6:31]  ⁴ sn Whoever takes up his cause will die by morning. This may be a warning to the crowd that Joash intends to defend his son and to kill anyone who tries to execute Gideon. Then again, it may be a sarcastic statement about Baal’s apparent inability to defend his own honor. Anyone who takes up Baal’s cause may end up dead, perhaps by the same hand that pulled down the pagan god’s altar.

[6:31]  ⁵ tn Heb “fight for himself.”

[6:31]  ⁶ tn Heb “for he pulled down his altar.” The subject of the verb, if not Gideon, is indefinite (in which case a passive translation is permissible).

[11:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “bore.”

[11:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “in the house of our father.”

[13:23]  ¹³ tn Heb “our hand.”

[18:1]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “an inheritance.”

[18:1]  ²⁰ tn Heb “because there had not fallen to them by that day in the midst of the tribes of Israel an inheritance.”